Nothing But Trouble (Malibu University Series)(60)

I slide into bed making sure to stay on my side. It’s a California king-size bed. This should keep some respectable distance between us. Otherwise it’ll be another sleepless night for me.

“Dead Pool 2.”

“Oh good. I love Dead Pool. Do you mind? My feet are cold.”

No sooner has she made this announcement than her feet are on mine. Cold doesn’t even begin to describe them. I yelp, jerking them back. “The hell! Are you…what the…I’ve dissected dead things with more body heat.”

Laughter breaks out. Head thrown back, uncontrollable laughter. It’s husky and sexy as hell. A familiar sensation stirs in my balls. This was a mistake.

“Gimme those frozen toes.”

Still smiling, she narrows her eyes. “What are you going to do?”

“I’m not having those dead things sneak up on me in the middle of the night. Hand them over.”

Chewing on her lip, she considers my command. “You’re very bossy tonight.”

There’s a teasing note in her voice that feeds my lust. I wonder what it would sound like whispered in my ear as I’m driving my dick inside of her. The image has my heart thrashing inside my chest.

“What are you thinking about? You have a weird look on your face.”

I can’t answer. I’m too busy watching her pull her legs out from beneath the covers and extending them in my direction. I love her legs. Not a single blemish or freckle. Pale and curved in all the right places. I’d love them even more wrapped around my waist.

She places her feet in my lap, and I shift my hips to hide my hard-on. Her delicate toes are painted light purple and so damn cute. I picture them rubbing up and down my shaft.

“Nothing. I’m thinking about your dead toes.”

She laughs again. I take her feet between my hands, push my thumbs into the arches. Her eyelids get heavy and her mouth slack. I give her toes a gentle tug and a soft whimper slips out.

“Oh God, that feels so good…” She gasps when I cup them and gently squeeze. “Don’t stop.”

And as I watch her face glow with pleasure, I say what’s been on my mind since we got back. “I’m sorry my parents were rude to you. I shouldn’t have forced you to come.”

There’s only understanding on her face. No pity, no judgment. I can tell her anything and not feel threatened. That’s never happened to me before and the feeling is addicting as hell. I am fucking crazy about this girl and every minute I’m with her I fall deeper and deeper.

I play with her toes, slide my index finger along the sensitive skin between each of them. She shivers and inhales sharply. I look up, into her heavy-lidded eyes, and time stands still. I see my life, next year in med school. No sleep. I’m miserable, just going through the motions. Then I see Alice living her life. Laughing with her friends…talking to the douchebag in her film class. And my heart sinks into my gut.

“Stop apologizing,” she murmurs, snapping me out of the moment. “I wanted to go with you. You don’t need to be responsible for me the way you are for everything and everyone else…I will say this, they’re actually worse than you described them. Now I know why Brian is so troubled.” She presses her toes into my abs and I swallow down a groan. “I have no idea how you turned out so well.”

“They definitely did their best to screw us up, but my brother started using because of a girl.”

Her flashing eyes, burning with curiosity, scan my face. She sits up abruptly, takes her feet back, and crosses her legs. I instantly miss them. “How?”

Exhaling tiredly, I decide on the abridged version. “Brian was always the perfect son. Amazing swimmer, nationally ranked. Great water polo player. Academic highest honors––you know, all that. Sophomore year a girl named Jessie Turner transferred in from Santa Cruz. Gorgeous, best-looking girl in school and that’s saying a lot. She ran with a really fast crowd––already doing eight balls as a sophomore.”

Alice’s eyes get even bigger.

“Yeah. Played the broken damsel part like a fucking Oscar winner. Brian fell hard for her. He started doing coke to party. She was always taunting him into shit. Saying he didn’t have the balls for it…anyway, it worked. He started experimenting. Started cutting school. Got kicked off the water polo team for not showing up for a game. Then he won a swim meet and tested positive. My parents sent him straight to rehab…while Brian was in rehab, Jessie overdosed and died.”

A gasp has me looking up into Alice’s soft brown eyes. I won’t lie. In the past, I’ve used women as a refuge from all the responsibility weighing on me as much as they used me for their own self-interest. It was a perfect arrangement. The problem is the high-flying vibes only lasted until the following morning. Then I’d wake up alone and find myself scraping bottom again. But Alice? It’s not her body that gives a man a soft place to land––it’s her eyes.

“He went off the rails. Broke out of rehab and went on a three-month bender that had my parents picking him up in a drug den in San Francisco. After that it was just more of the same. He never even got his high school diploma…”

She takes my hands in hers, tugs on my fingers the same way I tugged on her toes, her gaze cast down on where we touch.

“I was thirteen and the first lesson I learned about love was that it could ruin your entire life.”